Introduction

SonarTRX sidescan sonar software makes it easy to view, extract bathymetric raw-data, and generate map-images (geo-referenced images) of the seabed from sidescan sonar recordings. SonarTRX products can be part of a very affordable tool-kit for exploring & mapping the seabed from your kayak, jet ski or small boat.

The screen-capture of the SonarTRX viewer (above) and the mosaic image below is from an area with coral reef patches and sand channels with sand waves. The above picture shows a very "noisy" environment above the reef as compared to the sand channels. It was recorded from a kayak using hardware & software costing < ~ $2,500 (U.S). (Note: Even lower cost sonars are available, making it possible to do sidescan surveys for a litte more than $1,000, including hardware & software.) The slant range corrected, geo-referenced image below is generated by SonarTRX from a recording made from a kayak, using a Humminbird 998c-SI. It shows sand channels with wave ripples between patches of coral reef:

Geo-referenced images created by SonarTRX can be viewed and annotated with Google Earth using KML, or they can be imported to other mapping and GIS programs for further processing. The use of KML files to reference the images, allows for low cost sharing of sidescan image-tiles by simply distributing the kml files and uploading the associated images to any web-server. SonarTRX images can be imported to ESRI products, Manifold GIS, Global Mapper, QGIS and other GIS systems.

Please see the support page for the latest release notes. There is also a short video availalbe from the tutorials page and example image-output on the samples page. The samples can be explored with Google Earth or viewed online with the Google Earth Plugin.

To request a trial, please contact sales@sonartrx.com and include your complete contact information and information about what type of sonar(s) you would like to process data from. The products can be purchased from our online store.